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Research dossier · History & Society

Capture of Saddam Hussein

2003 U.S. military operation in the Iraq War

Layered newspapers, civic records and oral-history reels arranged as chronological evidence
History and societyInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionAug 8, 2026
Entity authoritySource title only
Source-derived summary

Saddam Hussein, the deposed president of Iraq, was captured by the United States military in the town of Ad-Dawr, Iraq, on 13 December 2003. The military operation to capture him was codenamed Operation Red Dawn, after the 1984 American film Red Dawn.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Capture of Saddam Hussein” is 2003 U.S. military operation in the Iraq War. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Capture, Saddam and Hussein, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewMost valuable as an event-and-institution map that identifies actors, dates and record creators for deeper historical inquiry. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—2003, 1984—that can be checked directly. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. For this dossier, Capture, Saddam and Hussein is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “2003 U.S. military operation in the Iraq War” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

Chronology, provenance and viewpoint should be read together before a broad social or political interpretation is accepted. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 8, 2026. The first chronological checks are 2003 and 1984.

Critical limits

Official terminology may obscure informal participation, dissent or communities documented only indirectly. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Compare institutional narratives with records created by participants and affected communities. Dates and formal titles are useful anchors, but not substitutes for context.

Best used for
  • Event chronology
  • Institutional context
  • Locating named record creators
Verify next

Contemporary correspondence, government or organizational records, oral histories and cited historical scholarship.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Capture of Saddam Hussein”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Capture of Saddam Hussein primary sources, Capture of Saddam Hussein archive and Capture research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Capture of Saddam Hussein”?
  2. Who created the surviving record, and for what administrative purpose?
  3. Which voices are present, absent or mediated by the institution?
Subject index

Search terms from this dossier

Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Capture of Saddam Hussein” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.